Always Supported in All Ways

This piece is written in response to a question that my Aunt sent to me. This question is number seven in a series of which I learned is eight instead of nine. I received this question as an invitation to reflect, I invite you to do the same. I share it here with you now.

Which three people had the greatest positive impact on your life in 2020, and when do you plan to tell them?

I noticed a resistance when I first read this question. The resistance with the words three people. Three people. How can I narrow a positive impact to three people? The resistance remained and now months later I am creating the space to sit, to reflect, to write, to share. I am able to sit and record my words here because I have given myself permission to move beyond the three people and expand it to three groups. I say give myself permission, because despite the many actions I have taken in my life, I feel a sense of obligation to rules and following the rules.  So here, in this space I am expanding the parameters, expanding the rules, widening the impact to groups of people rather than individuals themselves.

My Family

My family is the first “group.” My family has taken me in, and this welcoming, this held space of support has had a profound impact on my life. Life has a way of going along. There is a continuity to life, even when it feels like there are many discontinuous events, events that change, events that disrupt, event that shift the flow.  Looking back, I have been immersed with change (is it with change or in change), I have been immersed with change for a few years now.

Before the COVID-19 Pandemic began to make it deep and wide impact in the US, I was living in India. My family and I had a Whats App group and we kept in communication with one another in that way.  When NYC and Philadelphia ‘shut down’ in mid-March 2020, my sisters asked me to come home. To come home. To come home.

It is home where I have been since arriving here in the US.  Home has been in each of the houses of that my family lives in. For months I was living with my sister, brother-in-law and nieces during the week and my folks on the weekends. I also spent time with my sister and my sister-in-law in their home in Philadelphia.

For me, change has been with me. I have been immersed in change for a long while. The one thing that remains consistent throughout it all, is my ability to be at home with myself, my ability to be with myself, to sit with myself, to be with myself through it all, irrespective of the physical location I am in.

My Sangha

Sangha can be described here as the company that you keep. Those whom you hold near and close to you, those who support you, those who see you, who know you, who accept you. Those who are able to sit with you and be with you, hold you when you need to be held, lift you up when you need to be lifted, dance with you while you are dancing, laugh out loud with you, while simultaneously reiterating that this too shall pass, that this too is temporary. This and all moments are here for us to evolve, to move beyond, to step forward.

My sangha, the community that supports me continues to have a positive impact on my life. They, as a collective and as individuals influence my life in ways that I am able to acknowledge and witness now and I know that they are also influencing my life in ways that I will witness in the future.

My Self

Yes. You read this right. Me. I, myself have had a positive impact on my own life. How? You might ask, how can this be? Why? You might ask, why is this? 

I show up for myself every day. I am here with myself every day. I am here for myself every day. As I deepen my relationship with my Self, as I expand my awareness of my Self, my patterns, my stories, my tendencies. As I witness and observe these aspects of myself, I continue to gain deeper and deeper insight; I arrive at moments with clarity instead of confusion. I am able to witness events that which are happening around me, events that are unfolding and happening for me with distance, from a seat of separation, rather than being entangled and enmeshed within them. I know that events are neutral and I am aware that it is me, that I, myself bring the emotion, the feeling, the narrative, the reactions, the response in to the moment, in to the event. Not the other way around.

This is possible through my practice; through the commitment I have made and keep to myself. To show up on my mat, to show up on my cushion, to face myself, to be with myself, to turn toward myself rather than run away, hide or numb.

All of this requires volition, requires courage, requires will and steadfastness.

You know what else it requires, support. The KNOWINGNESS that we are supported and held all of the time, in all ways, always. Which brings me full circle to my family and sangha, the relationships in which I was born into and those which I have chosen, both of which I tend to and cultivate.  As relationships are at the foundation of all that we do, we cannot do it alone, we are a species that is reliant on others, outside of ourselves to be sustained, to be nourished.

That is the call of these times, to realize, to acknowledge, to be fully aware that we need each other, we need one another, that the systems that are in place are sustained through relationships, through connections. We cannot do this alone.

I know, I have tried. I have tried to do it all. To be all that I thought I needed to be. Do all that I thought I needed to do, everything I felt I should do, was obligated to do. It is exhausting. It is tiring. And you know what, it is lonely. It is lonely when you feel you go in it alone, when you feel you are all alone and no one gets you, no one understands you. I have actually said those words when folks have tried to support me, “you just don’t get it.” “You do not understand.” It is not to get; it is not for someone else to understand. No one will be able to truly grasp what another has gone through, is going through. One can sit and be with another. They can hold space and listen.

Life is not out to get us. Life is not a villain. We are not victims of life. Those are stories that we have been told, stories that we have acquired and taken on.  From these narratives we begin to see the world, we experience the world around us from that viewpoint, from that stance. We feel we cannot share, that we need to keep secrets, that asking for help is a sign of weakness. All of these are stories, stories that are made up so we feel alone, so we feel apart.

We are a part. We are a part of an intricate web of life. A web that is sustained, a web that relies on one another, on each other. We are never alone; we are never apart. We are always held; we are always supported. In the words of my teacher Anand Ji,

Know this and rest as such.

It is an honor to be supported by my family, friends and myself. I share my gratitude with them regularly and know I can share more, for there is never enough sharing and being full with gratitude. In the giving there is receiving. It is cyclical. They build upon one another.

To every being who has offered their grace by showing up and influencing my life, I thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.  Your interaction, your actions, your words, your presence has led me here to this very moment.

Bowing my head to you,

Sara